


Reunions

by MyOwnSuperintendent



Series: 1960s [7]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1960s, F/M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-02-04
Packaged: 2019-10-22 01:45:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17653664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyOwnSuperintendent/pseuds/MyOwnSuperintendent
Summary: After summers spent apart, Mulder and Scully reunite.





	Reunions

**Author's Note:**

> The sections of this story fall in between the sections of "Summers of Love" (which you should read first).
> 
> I don't own The X-Files or anything related to it. Hope you enjoy!

_1966_

They were supposed to meet at noon, but Mulder got there a little early—not on purpose, really, it just happened.  He didn’t have to wait very long, though; pretty soon he saw Dana coming towards him.  He waved, and she waved back. 

“Hi, Mulder,” she said when she came up to him.  “I hope I haven’t kept you waiting.”

“Oh, no, you didn’t,” he said.  “Don’t worry.”  She was wearing a dark blue dress; she was meeting him after she went to church, she’d said.  He was wearing an old sweater and jeans.  Usually he didn’t care at all about that kind of thing.  Right now, he suddenly did.  “Um…how was church?”

“Oh, it was fine,” she said.  She pushed her hair back behind her ear.  “Should we get lunch?  There’s a place near here I sometimes go.  Just sandwiches and things like that.  If that’s okay with you.”

“Yeah, that sounds good,” he said.  “Lead the way.”

The place was just around the corner, and they settled into opposite sides of a booth.  He watched her face over the menu.  God, she was cute.  It wasn’t as though he’d exactly forgotten that over the summer: it was hard to forget.  But it hadn’t been so central, when they were just writing.  It hadn’t been staring him in the face.

“How have you been?” Dana asked him, once they’d ordered.  “Since the end of the summer, I mean.”

“Oh, I’ve been good,” he said.  “Nothing too exciting.”  He tried to think of what to tell her.  “I saw Melissa the other day,” he said.  “She said she was going to have some people over next weekend.  Are you going to be there?”

Dana nodded.  “She invited me and Monica.  We’ll probably come.”

“That’s good,” he said.  A little silence.  “You’re moved back in now, right?  Do you like your new dorm?”

“I do,” she said.  “I’m with Monica and a couple of our other friends.  We have more space than last year, so that’s nice.  Our own kitchen and everything.”

“And what classes are you taking?” he said.  He sounded like an idiot, he thought.  He sounded like your friendly uncle who looks after you when you’re in a strange city and takes you out to lunch sometimes.

She told him about Physics II and her biology lab.  Because she was brilliant.  Well, he’d known that from her letters, anyway.  That paper about Einstein she’d sent him, the one he’d read and reread.  Who argued with Einstein their first year of college?  Well, Dana Scully did.

And he’d known that she was kind, too.  She’d told him that he could tell her about Samantha, and he had, and she’d written back like she understood.  He hadn’t thought he’d get that kind of understanding from anyone, now.

And damn it, she was so cute.

They were silent again now, and he didn’t know what to say.  It had been easy, writing to her.  She’d always had something to say that he’d wanted to respond to, and he’d liked thinking that she felt the same; she always wrote back quickly, anyway.  It had been easy, and he’d felt like they had a lot in common, even when they were on the opposite sides of a debate.  But now, here in person, it wasn’t anywhere near as easy.  He’d been wildly presumptuous, he decided.  He was way out of his depth.  He was way out of his league. 

“I’m still reading _The Art of Memory_ ,” she said.  “I really like it.  Thanks for telling me about it.”

“Oh,” he said.  “Oh, no problem.”  It was his turn to ask a question now, he knew.  He’d had a million things to say to her in his letters.  Why couldn’t he think of even one now?  “Um…how are your green curtains?  The ones you were telling me about.”  His turn to ask a really stupid question, apparently.

“Um…they’re fine,” she said.  “They look nice in the room.”  Another pause, probably not that long in reality, ten years long in his head.  She didn’t have anything to say to him either.  She was probably regretting being here, wondering why she’d ever agreed to have lunch.  “Have you been reading anything good?”

“Nothing special,” he said.  “Is there anything you’d recommend?”

She was quiet for a minute.  “I can’t think of anything,” she said, “right now.”

When she said she’d better go, a small part of him was relieved, because it meant he wouldn’t have to come up with anything else to say.  But most of him was furious—not with her, with himself.  A good thing gone.  He’d been stupid to think….he didn’t know what he’d thought. 

He didn’t really want to go to Melissa’s, the next weekend, because it made him think about the whole fiasco again, but he went anyway, because Frohike had said he had some articles to show him.  They were talking about the articles, arguing good-naturedly, when he heard the door open and close.  “Hi, Missy!” he heard a voice saying.  “I missed you this summer.”

“I missed you too, Dana!”  He couldn’t help glancing over; she was there, hugging Melissa.  Her back was to him, and he didn’t know if she’d seen him.  He almost hoped she hadn’t.  Then he wouldn’t have to stumble over things to say to her again.  He turned his head quickly, before she could look around, and went back to talking to Frohike.

That didn’t work for long.  Melissa came over and sat down on the couch next to them, either not realizing or not caring that they were in the middle of a conversation.  “Hey, Mulder,” she said.  “Did you see that your favorite person in the world is here?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.  And he’d never claimed that Dana was his favorite person in the world.

“Yeah, you do,” Melissa said.  “Dana.  You’ve done nothing but talk about her and her letters all summer.  Remember?”

“I haven’t done nothing but talk about her,” Mulder said.  He liked Melissa, for the most part, but sometimes she got hold of something and wouldn’t let it die.  And in this situation, that was really not helping.

“Sure,” Melissa said, grinning at him; on the other side of him, Frohike was grinning as well, which wasn’t helpful either.  “Well, she’s here, anyway.  I would have thought you’d be excited about that, is my point.  Dana!” she called, before he could say anything else.  “Did you see that Mulder’s here?”  Dana was over at the table now, pouring herself a drink, but she turned at Melissa’s words.  She looked like she was blushing a little, but maybe it was because it was hot in the room.

“Yes, I saw,” she said, walking over to them.  “Hi, Mulder.  It’s nice to see you again.”

“Nice to see you too,” he said, and tried to think of something more interesting to say, and failed utterly.

“Well, I’ll let you sit here, Dana,” Melissa said, getting up from the couch.  “I’m sure you guys want to talk.”

“I also wanted to talk to you—” Dana began, but Melissa was already halfway across the room.

“We’ll talk later!” she shouted, and then she had disappeared into the kitchen.  Mulder wondered if it would interfere with his commitment to non-violence if he killed Melissa.  He wondered if, at this stage, killing her sister could possibly make things more uncomfortable between him and Dana.

“Well, hi,” Dana said. 

“Hi,” he said.  “How was your week?”

“Pretty good,” she said.  “What about you?”

“Pretty good too,” he said. 

She sipped at her drink.  He sipped at his.  Frohike was staring at them in an annoying way.

Mulder was wondering if he should make an excuse to leave her alone when she set her drink down on the table and turned to him.  “I’m going to go sit on the fire escape,” she said.  “You can come with me.  I mean, if you’d like to.”

The fire escape—that was where they’d sat and talked the first few times they’d met, back at the end of the spring.  Before the letters.  When they’d first started learning a little bit about each other—when he’d decided that she was an interesting person, someone he wanted to write to.  “Sure,” he said.  “I’d like that.”

They made their way through Melissa’s room to the fire escape; it looked out on the wall of the next building, mostly, but you could see the sky too.  Dana slipped through the window first, and Mulder followed her, taking a seat next to her, hoping he could efface whatever impression he’d made the other day.

She was the first one to speak, though.  “I really liked writing with you this summer,” she said.  “Getting your letters—it was so nice.  But I think…maybe I was a little weird the other day.  Just because it’s different, you know.  Writing letters and talking in person.  But I wouldn’t want you to think that I didn’t like talking to you.  Because I did.  I do.”

So cute and so smart and so much braver than him.  But he could try his best.  “I didn’t think you were weird,” he said.  “I thought I was being the weird one.  It was like you said—it was different.  But I really like talking to you too.”

“Oh, good,” she said, and now she was smiling.  “So we can keep talking, then?”

“Definitely,” he said.  “I wouldn’t…I’d really miss it if we couldn’t.”  He thought back to what they’d been talking about in their last letters.  “So you’re liking the book?”

“Yeah!” she said.  “I actually finished it on Wednesday.  That last chapter…wow.”

“I thought you’d like it,” he said.  “It made me think of you.”  Was that a dumb thing to say?

It didn’t seem like it.  “Thanks,” she said, smiling again.  “That’s really sweet, Mulder.” 

“She has another book that looks interesting too,” Mulder said.  “About Giordano Bruno.  I just got it at the library, but I haven’t started it yet.”

“That sounds good,” said Dana, although there was something in her voice that made him wonder if she was really paying attention.  He looked at her inquiringly, and she shook her head.  “Sorry.  I am listening.  It’s just…there’s something else too.  I was…well, I was wondering…since we like writing to each other, and talking…and it’s always really interesting…”  He hadn’t expected the conversation to take this turn, but he was riveted now, wanting to know where it would lead.  “I thought maybe…would you want to go out together sometime?  If you’re into that kind of thing.”

“Sure, I’m into it,” he said.  The words didn’t make him sound as bowled over, as thrilled, as he actually was.  Maybe that was a good thing.  Maybe he didn’t want to come on too strong.  No, screw that, he thought.  This wasn’t some stranger.  It was Dana, someone he knew so well—someone he’d been writing to all summer, someone he felt understood him, and he wanted her to know how exciting this sounded to him.  “I mean, that sounds amazing,” he said.  “I’d love to do that, Dana.”

“Really?” she said, and she almost looked shocked, and he wondered if she’d been thinking about him the same way he’d been thinking about her and feeling like it could never work out the way she wanted it to.  That seemed kind of ridiculous to him, because she was amazing, and he figured she had to know it.  But maybe it was true.

“Yeah, really,” he said.  “I’ve been thinking about it too.”

She was definitely blushing this time, but she looked happy.  “I was kind of nervous to ask you,” she said. 

“Well, I’m glad you did,” he said.  And then, because she’d been taking the initiative all evening and he figured it was time he did the same, now, he leaned in closer to her.  Put his hand on her cheek.  And she looked up at him with those blue eyes, and he closed the space between them, kissing her.  And she kissed him back.

“Now I want to hear all about everything,” she said, when they pulled apart.  “What you’ve been doing since we last wrote.  And what you’ve been reading.  And your latest theories about alien life.”

And they talked and talked, there on the fire escape, until she looked at her watch and said yikes, it was already eleven, she had to get back.  He didn’t know how it had gotten to be that late, and she didn’t seem to either.  He said he’d call her the next day, and she smiled and said she’d like that.  And everything seemed right, then, and he didn’t even mind Melissa’s knowing look when they went back inside.

 

_1967_

He practically smashed the buzzer when it rang, in his haste to let her into the building.  He opened the door to his apartment then, and he could hear her coming up the last few stairs before he saw her, standing there at the end of the hall.  And when she saw him too, there was that smile—the one she gave him when it was just the two of them, the one he’d missed so much this summer—and then she was running down the hall towards him.  And he held out his arms, and when she was a few steps away she leapt up and threw her own arms around his neck, and he caught her up, held her close. 

“Dana,” he murmured, in between kisses.  “Dana.”  Just her name, but now she was here, now she could hear him saying it again. 

“Mulder,” she murmured back.  “Mulder, I missed you so much.”

“I missed you too,” he told her.  “God, Dana, I love you…”

“Let’s go inside,” she said, and he nodded against her, carrying her back through the door to his apartment, kicking it firmly closed.  Her legs were still wrapped around his waist, her body pressed to his.  It was having an effect on him.  Then she jumped down and said, “Mulder, I want to make love with you,” and that had an effect on him too.

“I want that too, Dana,” he said.  “You’re sure?”  He would be her first, he knew, and he wanted all this to happen at her pace.  She’d told him she trusted him completely.  He wouldn’t do anything to change that.

Not that he wasn’t very, very happy when she said, “Yes, I’m sure.”  She stepped closer then, kissed him again.  “I love you.”  Another kiss.  “And I want to be with you this way.”  Another kiss.  “And I did get that diaphragm, like I told you.  And it wasn’t easy.  And I have it in right now.  So I’m not going to waste all that work.”

He laughed and kissed her back.  “You’ll have to tell me the whole story in detail,” he said.  “But later, okay?  Because right now I want you so badly.”  She nodded and took his hand, and he wasn’t sure who led whom, but in another minute they were lying together on his mattress, exploring each other with kisses and touches, getting reacquainted after a summer of torturous separation.

“Need to touch you,” she said, tugging at his shirt, and he shifted to help her get it off, and then she was running her hands along his chest, pressing kisses to bare skin.  It felt even more wonderful than he’d remembered: he hadn’t touched her at all since he’d visited her at the lake, more than a month ago now, and even then they hadn’t been able to do as much as they would have liked, since her family was around.  He needed this.

“Let me touch you too,” he said.

“Please,” she said; she was wearing a sundress that fastened down the back, and she turned so he could reach the buttons.  He tried to concentrate on that, just undoing them one by one, but that was hard, when each one revealed another inch of her, and her skin was so soft and seemed made for him to kiss, so he did.  Just lightly, on her back, but she sighed, a little breathy noise that he’d come to know well over the months of being with her, one that made him more turned on than anything.  And then he had her dress off, and she was there in just her underwear, and she was too beautiful for him to think about anything else.

“You’re so gorgeous, Dana,” he told her.  “Just so…I’ve never seen anything this beautiful.”  She blushed; he could see the flush on her chest too, and now she might have been even more beautiful than she was a minute ago. 

“Thank you,” she whispered.  “You’re…you’re beautiful too, Mulder.”  And he felt like it was true, when she said it.  Then she reached out and started unfastening his jeans, and he reached for the clasp of her bra, and in another minute or two they were both naked, lying there.  “Do you want to…what should we…?”

“Let’s go slow,” he said.  “I want to make this good for you.”  He knew she’d been cautious about taking this step; she’d told him from early on that she wanted to wait, and now that they were finally here he didn’t want her to be sorry.  And honestly, he was feeling a bit cautious himself at the moment.  It had been a while, for him.  And he’d never been a girl’s first before, anyway, and it seemed like something you shouldn’t mess up.  He’d probably be feeling a lot more nervous than he was, actually, if it wasn’t for how much he loved Dana, in a way he’d never loved anyone, and for the way she was looking at him now, somehow both shy and ridiculously sexy.  He wanted her like crazy.  And he wanted to make her happy.

He started by touching her breasts, which wasn’t new, at least, although it still felt about as exciting as discovering one of the secrets of the universe.  Because it was her.  Because it was Dana, and she was soft and sweet, and her eyes would get dark when she looked at him, and when he bent his head, kissed her there lightly and then more firmly, ran his tongue over a nipple and then sucked on it, she’d tug at his hair—he loved that about her, the way she grabbed his hair and pulled like she had absolutely no self-control—and gasp his name, “Mulder Mulder Mulder.”  And right now she was shifting on the mattress as he touched her, rocking her hips, pressing against him, and oh God.  He didn’t know if he could go slow.

She looked up at him, her face more flushed now, and then her hand was on his cock, and he jumped at her touch, groaning.  “Jesus, Dana.”

“I’ve missed this,” she said, stroking him, tentatively for the first few seconds, then more firmly, finding a rhythm.  It had been too long.  “I thought about touching you all summer, Mulder.  You don’t know how much.”

“I have…oh God…some idea,” he said.  “From your letters…”

“I didn’t put everything in the letters, though,” she said.  “I couldn’t have written to you every time I was thinking about you, Mulder.  That would have been…it would have been impossible.”

“You’re still skeptical,” he said.  “You should…be more open to extreme possibilities…oh God, Dana.”  This was getting too one-sided, he decided, and he reached out to touch her too, sliding a hand up her thigh to stroke between her legs.  This wasn’t entirely new either, but neither was it familiar; they’d done this for the first time on the last evening they’d spent together, back in May, right before she’d gone home to Maryland for the summer.  And he’d replayed it in his mind almost every night for the past few months: the feel of her when he had his fingers inside her, the way she’d moaned his name, her face tightening and then slackening as she came.  But you couldn’t live on just memories.  The real thing was always better, and this was no exception.  She was already wet, which made him, if possible, harder, and he circled his thumb around her clit, watching her face, listening to her breath.  He thought he’d made her feel pretty good, the last time, but you could always improve.

“Mulder…” she said.  “A little…a little harder…oh yes, that’s good…”  And he followed her instructions, slipping one finger inside her, then two, looking at her as she squirmed against him, urged him on. 

“We could…we could go ahead,” he said.  “If you’re ready…”

“I think I’m ready,” she said.  But when he moved a hand to her thigh he could feel it.  Her leg tensing.

“Are you okay?” he asked. 

“I’m okay,” she said.  “It’s not…I really do want this.  I want you.  I’m just…I’m still a little nervous.  Does that make sense?”

“It makes lots of sense,” he said; he held out his arms, and she cuddled against him, her head under his chin.  “It’s something new, right?”

“Yeah,” she said.  “That’s what it is, Mulder.  It’s not anything you did.  Or didn’t do.  It’s just that I haven’t done this before.”

“I know,” he said.  “Are you worried it will hurt?  Because it shouldn’t, too much, since you’re wet already and—”

“I know that,” she said.  “I’m going to be a doctor, remember?”

“I couldn’t forget,” he said.  He kissed the top of her head.  “Are you worried that—I don’t know, your parents are going to bust in here?”

She giggled.  “No.  They don’t even know where you live.  And I don’t care what they’d think about this, anyway.  No, it’s none of that, Mulder.  It’s just…I’m getting in my own head, I guess.  Thinking too much.”

“Hey, that’s okay,” he said.  “You’re not the only one, if that makes you feel better.  I think that’s pretty easy to do, in this kind of situation.  If that helps.”

She nodded.  “It does, actually.”  They were quiet for a minute.  Mulder wasn’t sure if he should say anything more or if he should let Dana take the lead now.  He hadn’t overstated the case when he’d told her that she wasn’t the only one who was thinking too much.  He didn’t want to push her, of course.  But he didn’t want her to think she had to be the one to direct this; that seemed like another kind of pressure.  “What’re you thinking now?” she asked him.

“Honestly?” he said.

“Of course honestly.”

“That I want you so much,” he told her, “but I don’t want to screw this up for you.”

“You won’t,” she said.  “Mulder, you couldn’t.”  And then she kissed him again, softly, sweetly, and he held her against him as they lay there.  He stroked her hair, ran the other hand down her side, skimming the curve of her breast, her hip.  Tried not to think too much.  Thought about what to do next.

“Can I try something?” he asked her.

“What kind of something?”

“I want to…I want to taste you,” he said.  “Try and make you come that way.  Can I do that?”

Her face was flushed again now, but she looked eager, almost hungry, as she nodded.  “Yeah.  Yeah, you can do that.”

And this was new: she’d done it for him, once, on that last day, but he hadn’t done it for her yet.  Not that he hadn’t thought about it.  Roughly a million times.  Not that he wasn’t giving himself stern mental instructions to control himself, because right now, even looking at her, with his hands on her parted thighs, was almost too exciting.

And actually having his mouth on her was even better.  She tasted like…hell, he couldn’t describe it.  Something amazing, anyway.  And he’d always loved seeing her react to him: she was never shy about it, whether she was letting out little breaths as he kissed her neck or groaning out his name when he had his fingers inside her.  But all of that was nothing to the way she was reacting now.  Now, with his tongue on her clit, she was loud.  “Mulder,” she was saying.  “Mulder, that’s good, that’s so so good, don’t stop, don’t stop, please,” and she was pulling his hair again, hard but he couldn’t care less, and shifting back and forth beneath him, pressing herself against his face.

He chanced a glance up at her: he wanted to see what she looked like, in this moment.  And she was beautiful.  Her head thrown back.  Her eyes dark.  Her cheeks a bright red, as vibrant as her hair.  She looked down at him.  “Don’t stop, Mulder, please.”

And he didn’t.  He kept going, listening to her reactions to figure out what worked best, and when he could tell she was very close he murmured against her, “Come for me, my gorgeous girl.”  One more long lick then, and she cried out, his name mingling with wordless shouts, and he moved up the mattress to hold her.  His Dana.  His gorgeous, gorgeous Dana.

She drew a long, shaky breath.  “We’re going to have to do a lot more of that,” she told him.

“I think that can be arranged,” he said.

She moved her hand down, lightly stroking his cock again.  “Do you want me to do you too?”

“Dana,” he said, “that sounds amazing, and I absolutely would not last more than two seconds.  So next time.  I don’t want to…delay the main event.”

“Next time, then,” she said, and she was smiling, and that was almost too much too.

“I might not…I don’t think I’ll last that long this time either,” he told her.  “When we make love, I mean.  I’ll try, really, but just don’t take it personally.  Wait, that’s not what I mean.  Do take it personally.”

He thought he sounded like an idiot, but he guessed she didn’t think so, from the way she was looking at him.  “What you’re saying,” she said, “is that I turn you on.”

“Yes,” he said.  “Yes, absolutely.  So much.”

“You turn me on too,” she said, and then she lay back on the mattress, pulling him with her. “Come on, Mulder.  I know I’m ready, now.”

He kissed her, slowly.  “I love you, Dana.”

“I love you too,” she said.  “Now come on.”

“So impatient all of a sudden,” he said, and she made a face at him, and he guided himself inside her.  He tried to keep it gentle, still a little worried about messing this up for her.  He could hear her breathing, quick and harsh.  “You okay?” he asked.

“Very okay,” she said.  “It’s…wow.  It’s different.  Good different,” she added quickly.  She rocked her hips, slowly, deliberately.  “Keep going,” she said, and he did, but he had to kiss her again first, because of how much he loved the expression on her face.

It wasn’t perfect, which he’d known not to expect, not when it was all so new.  They had to spend time shifting around, trying to find a comfortable position where neither of them had their neck at an awkward angle or an elbow jabbed into the other.  They weren’t in the same rhythm, although that got better towards the end.  And, as he’d warned her, it really didn’t last very long.  But somewhere in there, he stopped worrying.  He couldn’t worry, because he was making love to Dana Scully.  Dana Scully, who was his girlfriend, who trusted him enough for this.  Dana Scully, who felt amazing around him, who he couldn’t stop touching, couldn’t be close enough to.  Who said his name, in a soft, aching, sexy voice, when he moved inside her, when he rubbed her clit.  Whom he loved, and when he told her that again, she whispered it back to him, and he knew she absolutely meant it.  “Dana,” he gasped, when he finished, “Dana, Dana, Dana” because she was it, she was all he could think about.

He kissed her afterwards, pulling her against him.  “You were amazing,” he said.  “Was that…was it all right?  For you?”

“More than all right,” she said; she’d draped an arm over him, and she didn’t seem inclined to move, which made him very happy.  “I wasn’t…I’m not sure what I expected.  But this was better than that.”  She pressed a kiss to his chest, softly.  “Thank you for giving me such a good first time.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” he said.  “And…like I said before.  Sorry I couldn’t make it last longer.  I’ll make it up to you.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Dana said.  “It was wonderful, Mulder.  I am not at all unsatisfied.  But if you really feel like you want to make things up to me…”  She tapped his nose, smiling.  “We’ll add that to the list for next time,” she said, and then she sat up and stretched.  “I should clean up a little.  Can I use the bathroom?”

“Of course,” he said.  “You want me to get you anything while you’re in there?  Some water or anything?”

“Water would be great,” she said, getting up.  He checked out her ass, openly, as she walked towards the bathroom.  After what they’d just done, he didn’t see any point in trying to be subtle about it.

She’d appropriated his bathrobe when she came out, but it looked better on her anyway, so who was he to complain?  They made their way back to the mattress—as so often happened with them, they drifted there by common consent, not needing to talk about it—and settled down together, cuddled close.  He gave her the water.  “So,” he said, “can I hear the whole diaphragm story now?”

And the diaphragm story turned into other stories, things they’d done and things they’d seen that summer, things they’d been saving up to talk about.  A lot of how much they’d missed each other got mixed up in there, along with more quiet professions of love.  A lot of kissing too, a lot more touching.  They had dinner at some point in there, thrown together from what he had in his refrigerator because they didn’t want any other people around right now.  Another session of lovemaking, later that evening, a little more steady and no less miraculous.

“I should go,” she said, at last, regretfully.

“Don’t,” he said.

“I don’t want to either,” she said, “but you know I have a curfew in the dorm.”  She made a face and then kissed him again.  “It’s very unfair.  But you’re going to Melissa’s tomorrow, right?  That’s less than twenty-four hours.”

“It won’t feel like that,” he said.  “But yes.  I’ll be there.”

He kissed her lingeringly.  He walked her to the corner and got her a cab.  And back upstairs, he lay down and thought about her, wondering if he could sleep through until they went to Melissa’s the next evening, until he saw her again.

He got to Melissa’s as early as he could without completely ignoring the gathering’s scheduled start time, but Dana was already there.  And she was at his side as soon as he got in the door.  “Mulder!” she exclaimed.  “Hi.” 

There were other people there, probably, but Mulder couldn’t have told you who any of them were.  He was only paying attention to Dana, the way she kissed him, the way she led him to the couch and settled against his side.  “I missed you today,” she said.  “Even if it was only an afternoon.  Is that crazy?”

“If that’s crazy,” he told her, “then I’m crazy too.”

Her mouth was up against his ear, now.  “I kept thinking about yesterday,” she whispered.  “And…I know this sounds crazy too, I mean, I went my whole life without it before, but I really need to be with you again.  Or I’m going to do something desperate.  Do you think…could we leave a little early, maybe?”

She was never going to stop surprising him; he ought to know that by this point.  “We can do anything you want,” he said, “if you promise to stop talking like that while we are here.  Unless you want me to embarrass myself in public.”

She giggled.  “I’m so sorry,” she murmured.  She didn’t sound sorry at all, but then they both knew that he wasn’t really upset.  She kissed him again, her arms around his neck.

“Ugh,” Melissa said, sitting down next to them, suddenly.  “Look at this place.”  Mulder vaguely followed the direction of her gesture; she seemed to be pointing to the two of them and then to Byers and Starchild, who were intertwined in a chair on the other side of the room, engaged in some serious kissing.  “You’re proliferating.”

“Oh, Missy, we’re sorry,” said Dana.  She still didn’t sound very much like it.

“Guess I’ll have to get to used to it,” Melissa said, and, to tell the truth, she didn’t sound very upset either.  “Only don’t the two of you start with the whole on and off thing.  My heart can’t take it.”

“Just speaking for myself,” said Mulder, “I have no desire to be off.  Ever.”

“Mmm,” Dana said.  “Me neither.”  She was looking at him with the sweetest smile.

“Okay, I know when my presence is not required,” Melissa said, getting up.  “I’ll leave you to yourselves.”  But she stopped for a minute, before she went, and put a hand on Dana’s shoulder, and she was smiling too.  “I’m glad you’re so happy, Dana,” she said.  “Just treasure it up, okay?  Because it’s a great thing, having more happiness in the world.”

“I will,” Dana said.  “Thank you, Missy.”

“You too,” Melissa said, turning to Mulder.  “And don’t ever do anything to hurt my sister, unless you’d enjoy having our entire family join forces to kill you.  Because that’s maybe the only thing I can agree with my dad on.”

“Missy!” Dana said.  “I can take care of myself.  And he wouldn’t, anyway.”

“I wouldn’t,” Mulder said, as seriously as he could, wanting them both to know that he meant it.  “That’s a promise.”

“Good,” Melissa said.  “All right, I’ll leave you alone, then.”

They stayed for a little longer, but they realized quickly that they were pretty much useless to the rest of the group that night, as far as social engagement was concerned.  “My place?” he whispered to her, in a quiet moment, and they walked downstairs together and hurried down the street.

 

_1968_

“We should talk,” Dana said.  She was sitting cross-legged on the mattress, wearing only one of his sweatshirts and her underpants, which was a little distracting.  But her voice was serious, so Mulder tried to be serious too.

“Okay,” he said, putting the finishing touches on their sandwiches and carrying them over.  He sat down next to her.  “What about?”

“Next year,” Dana said.  “Not that I want to get too far ahead of ourselves, or anything like that.  We have this year, for sure, and I want it to be a good one too.”  Considering that she’d just gotten back to New York three hours ago, he thought that was a fair point.  “But next year…we should talk about our plans.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Mulder said.  “What are you thinking?  You said you’ll hear in November, right?”

She nodded.  “By November, I should know.  And I’d love to stay in New York, at Columbia, but it’s not exactly easy to get in there.” 

“I really do believe you will,” he said.  “And I’m not just saying that because I love you, or to make you feel better.”

“I know,” she said, smiling.  She reached out to touch his hand, and he took hers and held it, tightly.  “And I love that about you.  You…you make it easier for me to believe, too.  So if I get into Columbia and stay here, everything’s great, then.  But if I don’t…what are you doing with those classes, first of all?  Did you sign up for anything?”

“I did, actually,” he said.  “I’m taking one night class, this fall.  For social work.  It’s just introductory.”  He shrugged.

“It’s not just anything,” Dana said.  “Mulder, that’s great!  I’m really proud of you.”

“It really isn’t that big a deal,” he said.

“Well, I think it is,” Dana said.  “You’re going to be so good at this.  And you know I’m not the only one who thinks so.  You know your boss wouldn’t have suggested it to you, if he didn’t think so too.  So why are you trying to downplay it?”

“I’m not,” he said.

“You are,” she said.  “How come?  You can tell me.”  He looked down, and she moved closer to him on the mattress, putting a hand on his cheek.  “This conversation isn’t going to work very well if you do this.  Is something wrong?”

“Not really,” he said.  “I mean, I don’t know.  It’s…well, this is new, right?  I didn’t even think about doing this, before this summer.”

“That’s true,” she said.  “But it’s something you want to do, right?”

“Yeah,” he said.  “I do, actually.  I was reading the stuff for the first class, and it’s really interesting.  And I keep thinking about things I could do to help the kids at the center, if I had more background.”  He smiled, thinking of it.

“Exactly,” she said.  “So what’s the problem?”

He wasn’t sure how to articulate it himself.  “Well, you’ve always known what you wanted to do,” he said.  “All your life, right?”

“Since I was eight,” she said.  “But what difference does that make?”

“I don’t want to get in the way of that for you,” he said.

“How would you be getting in the way?” she asked.  “What’s wrong with us both having something that’s important to us?  I think that’s good.  It makes us both more interesting people.”

“But what if we can’t be in the same place?” he asked.  “If you end up going somewhere else for medical school.  And I’m studying here now and working at the center.  And you’re so important to me, Dana.  I know I want to be where you are.  And I know I said I would move with you if we had to, and I meant it, but now…now that I’m actually doing this, it just makes it more complicated.  And I wish it wasn’t.  So I’m sorry about that.”

“Hey,” she said.  “Look at me.”  He did, and she looked back at him, her expression serious and tender.  “You don’t have anything to be sorry for.  We’re a team, okay?  That’s why I wanted to talk.  Not so we could just do whatever was easier for me.  Being a doctor…yes, that’s incredibly important to me, Mulder.  But it’s not more important than what you want to do just because I’ve been thinking about it longer.  We both have work that’s important to us.  And then there’s…there’s us.  This.”  She gestured between the two of them.  “And yes, it’s all complicated.  But I bet it’s like this for a lot of people, and they figure it out.  And so will we, together. Okay?” 

She’d said that he made her believe, but she did the same for him.  He reached out for her hand again, taking it between both of his.  “Okay.”

“Good,” she said.  “Because there are lots of things we could do, Mulder.  If we end up in different places, we could write and visit all the time.”

“I’m not crazy about that, honestly,” he said.

“Neither am I,” she said.  “But we could.  People do.  Or once we know where I’m going to school, we could look into what they have there, for social work.  If you wanted to, of course.”

“Sure I’d want to,” he said.

“Or if I get into more than one place,” she said.  “Not that I’m counting on that.  But if I do, I could pick the one closest to New York, and we could…we could commute.  Live somewhere in between.  Especially if…”  She broke off, fiddling with the hem of the sweatshirt.  “We should talk about what you said at the lake.  About getting married.”

“Yeah,” he said.  “Yeah, we should talk about that.  Do you…you said you liked the idea?”

She nodded.  “I do, Mulder.  It’s just like I told you.  It’s hard to think about now, when I don’t know what’s going to happen yet.”

“And that makes sense,” he said.  “But I know I want to be with you, for…well, forever.”  He’d been nervous, for a long time, about putting it out there like that, about expecting that anyone would want to give him that kind of permanence.  There had been a time when he wasn’t even sure if he wanted it himself.  But with Dana…he felt like he could take that leap.

And it wasn’t too much, he guessed, if her face was any indication.  “I want that too,” she said.  “If I haven’t made it clear enough, I…I can’t imagine what it would be like without you, now.  I just want to talk about it more.  When we’d do it.  How we’d do it.”

“Well, first of all,” he said, “I haven’t forgotten what we talked about.  About me asking you after you’ve heard from the medical schools.  Which you will get into, by the way.”  She rolled her eyes at him, but she was smiling.  “So anything I say now, it’s not me asking.  It’s just us discussing the possibility.  If that makes it easier for you to think about.”  She nodded.  “I knew you weren’t sure about living together,” he said.  “And this…it’s more serious, I know that.  But I thought it might be—”

“No, you’re right,” she said.  “I actually feel better about this than about living together.  Even though I know it’s more serious.  Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but it just seems like…well, we’d know where we were.”

He liked the sound of that.  “Yeah,” he said.  “I know there are things we’ll have to figure out, obviously.  Like…”  It seemed like there were a lot of questions, suddenly.  Things about daily life he’d never given much thought to.  “What kind of place do you see us living in?”

“One with an actual bed,” she said, laughing.  “Sorry.  That’s actually a good question.  I…well, it depends on where we end up.  Obviously if we stay here, it’ll be an apartment, but even somewhere else…nothing too big, I don’t think.  After all, if we’re both in school, we’re not going to be millionaires.”

“We don’t take up too much space, anyway,” he said.  “At least you don’t.”

“I don’t know if it’s a good idea,” she said, in a voice of exaggerated dignity, “for me to marry someone who is so incredibly rude to me.”  But he kissed her then, and she laughed. 

“Say we did decide in November,” he said.  “Would that mean…the summer?  Is that long enough?  Too long?”  He didn’t really know how these things worked.

“Definitely not too long,” she said.  “I wouldn’t want to get married before I graduated, anyway.  Engaged is all right, but not married.”

“Makes sense,” he said.

“But there’s another thing,” she said.  “If we got married this summer and then I started school.  During medical school, and then for the first few years after that—well, everyone says you have no time for anything else.  I might not be that much fun to have around.  Are you…you’d have to be on board with that.”

“I’m on board,” he said.  “I wouldn’t want to wait that long, Dana.  And I’d get to see you more this way, anyway.”

“That’s true,” she said.  She was quiet for another moment, looking thoughtful.  “Do you want kids, Mulder?”

He hadn’t expected that question, although he probably should have, and he knew that she was right: it was something they should talk about.  And because of that, he didn’t want to give a quick, thoughtless answer.  “Honestly,” he said, “it’s not something I’ve really thought about before.”  She nodded; he couldn’t quite read her expression.  “Have you?  Do you know if you want kids?”

“I do,” she said.  “Not right away, while I’m in school.  I didn’t even think, before you, that I’d be married then.  But after that I do.  And I want more than one.”  She smiled at him.  “You don’t have to know right now, Mulder.  But will you think about it?  Because we should talk about that, before we decide anything.”

“Of course,” he said.  “Of course, Dana.”

They talked more that day and over the next two months, sorting through their questions about the future.  Some were big: how they’d decide where to live, how they’d support themselves, what he thought about kids (it took him a while, because he wanted to be serious about it, but when he started thinking fondly about babies with Dana’s blue eyes he decided that was probably a sign).  Some were decidedly less high stakes (“I just realized,” Dana said one evening, “that I’ve never lived somewhere I didn’t have to be home by a certain time.  Wow.  I hope I don’t go mad with the freedom”).  They didn’t say anything definite, because they’d agreed: not until November, not until she knew where she was going to school.  But something shifted in those months, became more solid day by day.  They didn’t say it, but they knew.

And then she called him, one day, and when she said, “Mulder, it’s me,” she sounded like she’d been crying.

“Dana,” he said, “what is it?  Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she said.  “Yes, I’m okay.  It’s good news, Mulder.  It’s…I got the letter.”  Her voice was almost a whisper now, reverent, awed, and he clutched the phone tighter as he listened.  “From Columbia.  I got in.  Mulder…I’m really going to be a doctor.”  He thought she laughed, then, but she might have been crying again.  “Mulder, I’m so happy.”

“And I’m so happy for you,” he said.  “Dana, that’s amazing.  And you’re amazing.  I knew you could do this.”

“I know you did,” she said.  “You always told me I could…and mostly I thought I could…but I just wasn’t sure.  Until today.  I’m so happy,” she said, that same awe in her voice, and he could practically see her smile through the phone.  “And then for us…for us it means…” 

“Yeah,” he said.  “God, I’m so proud of you, Dana.  Or should I call you Doctor Scully?”

“Not yet,” she said, laughing.  “Wait a few years.”

“Can I take you out tonight?” he asked.  “Celebrate with you?”

“I promised Monica and Ellen and Kathy that I’d celebrate with them tonight,” she said.  “We’re actually getting ready to go out—I just wanted to call and tell you first.  But we could do tomorrow?”

“That sounds good,” he said.  They arranged a place—a restaurant they both liked—and he told her, once more, how happy he was for her before they got off the phone. 

She was beaming when they met outside the restaurant that night.  “It still hasn’t worn off,” she told him.  “I don’t think I’ve stopped smiling since I got the letter. Well, at first I was in shock.  And then I cried a little.  But since then, I haven’t stopped smiling.”

“You deserve it,” he said, as they sat down.  “How was the celebration last night?  I hope this can live up to it.”

“I think it will,” she said, placing her hand over his.  “We did have a lot of fun, though.  We went dancing.  And we got a little drunk.  And Kathy got a lot drunk.”

“Wow,” he said.  “Didn’t Kathy remember whose celebration it was?  Shouldn’t you have been the one getting the most drunk?”

“Yes,” Dana said.  “But I know I have to pace myself.  Because it doesn’t take much—no short jokes,” she added sternly.

“I wasn’t going to make a short joke,” Mulder said.  “It’s your special day.  I know when I have to be nice.”

“Sure,” she said.  “Anyway, I know to pace myself, and Kathy’s not so good at that.  But it’s okay.  We got her home fine.  And I didn’t need to get drunk, anyway.  Because I was already so happy.”  She was beaming, still, and he leaned across the table to kiss her quickly.  She kept her hand in his.

She told him the story over dinner, how she’d picked up the letter at the mailroom, how she’d waited until she got back to the dorm to open it, not wanting to have that moment in public.  She’d known for just over a day, now, but she was already full of plans for the next fall, and he listened to her, thinking, for very far from the first time, how lucky he was.

“Do you want to come back to my place for a little?” he asked her, when they were done eating.  “I actually got you a present.  A congratulations gift, I guess.”

“Oh, Mulder, you didn’t have to,” she said.  “Did you just get it today?”

“No, I got it a month ago,” he said, and in answer to her look he said, “I told you I knew you’d get in.”

She shook her head.  “I forgive you, since it all worked out,” she said as they were walking in the direction of his apartment, “but you shouldn’t have jinxed it like that.”

“You’re talking about jinxes now?” he said.  “And you tell me there’s no evidence for the stuff I believe in.”

“Well, I don’t know,” she said, blushing.  “It’s not…I don’t exactly believe in jinxes.  I just think, in case there are jinxes, you shouldn’t do anything that might set them off.”

“I don’t exactly get the distinction,” he said.

“There is one, though,” she said, and he didn’t have the heart to argue with her, tonight, so he just kissed her again.

He was a little nervous when it came to it, when he handed her the package he’d wrapped as carefully as he could.  He’d found it in a secondhand store, and it had struck him as the perfect thing right away, but that didn’t mean…you never knew.  She undid the wrapping and lifted up the box.  “Mulder,” she said, “wow.  This is beautiful.”

He put his hand on the lid next to hers, not wanting her to open it immediately.  “It seemed right,” he said.  It was an old wooden box, with a carving on the lid: a snake wrapped around a staff.

“The Rod of Asclepius,” she said, touching it and smiling.  “You even got the right symbol.  Most people think it’s the caduceus.”

“I know,” he said.  “You told me once.”

“And you remembered,” she said.  “Thank you.”

“I thought you could keep things in it,” he said.  “Your stethoscope, maybe.  Or things like that.  There are a few compartments.”

“Let me see,” she said, and she went to open it, and this time he let her.  He thought he would be more nervous.  Somehow he wasn’t, right now.

At least not at this very moment.  But when she opened it, the lid was in front of her face, so he couldn’t see it.  And when she said, “Mulder…what…Mulder…is this…?” he wasn’t sure, without seeing her face, if he’d done this right.  If this was the right time, the right way.

But he’d done it, so he had to go on.  “Yes,” he said, and he moved so he could see her, staring down into the box.  There was a little tray at the top, where he’d placed the ring.  “We talked about…we said I could ask you now.”

“So ask me,” she said, and she looked up, and he felt better again.  Both because of the look on her face—her earlier bliss mixed with something slightly stunned around the eyes—and because he didn’t think she’d tell him to ask her just so she could turn him down.  Dana had never been cruel.

There was so much he could say to her, but he kept it simple.  “I love you, Dana,” he said, “and I can’t…I can’t imagine being without you now.  Will you marry me?”

“Yes,” she said.  “Yes, of course I will, Mulder,” and then she grabbed him and kissed him.  She was somewhere between laughing and crying, like she’d been on the phone yesterday.  That was a good sign, he thought.  That he could make her feel the same way that getting into medical school did. 

Of course, he was in much the same condition himself.  “I’m so happy,” he murmured against her.

“Me too,” she said.  “Me too, Mulder.”  Another kiss, a pause.  “Let me try the ring?”  He slipped it on her finger.  She looked down at it, smiling.  “Wow.” 

“You like it?” he asked.

“I love it,” she said.  “You’re very good at presents, Mulder.”

“Well, I figured that since I’m not so good at the quantity,” he said—he often forgot special occasions, and they both knew it—“I’d better make it count in terms of quality.”  He pressed her against him.  “Pretty soon,” he said, “I’ll get to say that I’m married to a brilliant doctor.”

“No more talking,” she whispered, kissing him again, her hands tugging at his shirt.  He took her hint.

 

_1969_

Dana was still asleep when Mulder woke up in the morning.  A part of him wanted to wake her up too, but the rest of him won out: the part that was content to lie there next to her and think about how he would get to wake up like this every morning from now on.

They hadn’t slept next to each other much, in the years of their relationship.  She couldn’t often sleep at his place, since she usually had to get back to her dorm—there was a curfew, and a lot of her lab classes met in the morning, anyway—and he couldn’t sleep at hers, since it was against the rules, and even if they’d found a way to sneak around them Monica was there on the other side of the room.  There had been visits during the summer, but he was pretty sure their parents wouldn’t have taken kindly to this kind of sleeping arrangement.  But now…there were no curfews.  No roommates.  No families to dictate the rules.  Now it was only them.

She stirred, then, and he watched her, shifting on the bed, finally opening her eyes.  “Good morning,” she said.

“Good morning.”

She smiled sleepily at him.  “We’re married, aren’t we?”

“As of four o’clock yesterday afternoon,” he said, “we are married.”

“That’s so good,” she said, snuggling closer to him, slipping an arm around his waist.  “That’s so good, Mulder.”

“Oh, Dana,” he said, “you don’t know how much I agree.”  He kissed her.  She was his wife.  He was kissing his wife. 

She held out her hand, looking at the ring—they’d used her grandmother’s, which had been handed down to her.  “Remember when I wore this so I could get my diaphragm?” she asked.  “So we could have lots of wild, illicit sex?  And now we’re respectable and married.”

“I remember,” he said.  Running a hand down her arm, he added, “And I think we can keep up the wild part, anyway.  If last night is any indication.”  She flushed, and he laughed, leaning in to kiss her forehead.  “Why are you blushing?  You said it yourself.  It’s all above board now.”

“I know,” she said.  “My mom—do you know what she said to me?  The night before last?”

“Do I want to know?” he asked.

“It’s nothing bad,” she said.  “She asked me if she needed to talk to me about what would happen on my wedding night or if I knew all about it already.  But it was the way she said it…she wasn’t asking if I knew just from hearing about it.”

“And did you tell her you knew?”

“Yeah, I did,” Dana said.  “And she said, ‘That’s what I thought.’  And then she said she knew we were going to be very happy together.  But I had no idea she knew.  And she didn’t seem upset about it either.”

Mulder shook his head, laughing again.  “I think your mom has unexpected depths, Dana.”

“I guess so,” she said.  She leaned her head against him.  “Wasn’t yesterday wonderful?  I hope everyone had a good time.  I wasn’t really paying attention to them.”

“What were you paying attention to?” he asked.

“You,” she said.  “You, and how happy I was.  I still can’t believe we’re really married, Mulder!”  A lingering kiss.  “I feel so lucky.”

“You feel lucky?” he said.  “I’m the lucky one.”

“Maybe we both are,” she said.  “But really, I feel like I’m dreaming.”

“I know the feeling,” he said.  “But we’re not dreaming, Dana.  Should I pinch you?”  She just laughed, so he pinched her side, and she squealed and shoved him, and then they were kissing again, and her hands were running down his chest, and they could do this whenever they liked, because they were married.  Married.  Maybe someday he’d get used to it, but not any time soon.

And the joy didn’t wear off as they settled into their apartment, as they established their daily routines.  He could still feel the smile breaking out on his face, a month and a half later, as she joined him at the table for breakfast.  “What’re you smiling at?” she asked.

He shrugged.  “Happy to see you.”

“You’re a sap,” she said, but she was smiling too.  As they ate, though, he could tell that she was a little nervous; she kept fiddling with her blouse, straightening the collar and cuffs.

“You’re going to do great, you know,” he said.  “And I can’t wait to hear about it.”

She looked up.  “Thanks, Mulder,” she said.  “I am excited.  It’s just…everything is starting today.”  She looked at the clock and got up, getting her bag from a chair.  “I have three classes today, but I should be back around four-thirty, I think.  What about you?”

“I’m working the morning and have a class in the afternoon,” he said.  “I should be back around the same time as you.  Maybe a little later.”

“I want to hear all about your class too,” she said.  “We’ll have to compare notes.” 

“We will.”  He got up as well, gathering his things.  They walked down together, as far as the corner.  “Have a good day,” he said, kissing her quickly.

“You too,” she said.  “See you tonight.”

And they would.


End file.
